Kickstarter suspended project Anonabox

by Kushal Azza · October 20, 2014

Anonabox is the talk of the town and the project is now again in the talk but this time it's bad news.

When the Web detective costume standing often leave much to be desired but this time seems to have nailed it. You must have heard about Anonabox , a router with Tor built. Several people was alerted as it might be a scam and something similar happened on Reddit. The evidence accumulated rapidly, Kickstarter had no choice but to suspend the project .

It is not the first time we met with a suspicious project in Kickstarter and unfortunately not the last.The problem is that some of them seem to be very convincing at first and no doubt that was the case with Anonabox . The promise of a miniature integrated router functionality Tor and nearly $ 600,000 in contributions indicated that there was great interest in the product. Most specialized media echoed the news, but a few hours of the first publications began to appear some blemishes on the record of Anonabox . On the one hand the technical implementation of Tor is questioned by arguing that the network was not designed to anonymize all and each of the connections but those that are considered riskier in relation to user privacy. However, doubts acquired another dimension when they appeared several links to Chinese websites selling electronics with miniature routers …

The model in question is the WT3020 which has also been described as a portable routers clone of TP-Link. This would not have become a problem if not for the detail Anonabox was presented as a project open source hardware with a custom design. August Germar , responsible for Anonabox had the ideal opportunity to clarify the situation with a chance ” Ask Me Anything “ on Reddit, which ended in a disaster. With cross-ignored questions and accusations. Inevitably, Germar must recognize that hardware Anonabox was produced by the Chinese company Gainstrong, including housing router. And to top Anonabox is a security nightmare .The base software is based on a version terribly misconfigured OpenWRT with an open wireless network and a root password backdoor, which was apparently “developer” .

Consequently, Anonabox project is been suspended from Kickstarter. With all the information available, it was concluded that Anonabox has broken at least two of the terms of use of Kickstarter, they are not offering products already on the market and presenting them as something new (the hardware itself) , not present the work of others as your own (the software) . A spokesperson for Kickstarter recalled that suspensions are permanent and project participants do not pay until completion, therefore, no one lost money.